Busi Mabuza has just been appointed Chair of the South African chapter of the BRICS Business Council. Also the chairperson of the Industrial Development Corporation, she speaks to FORBES AFRICA about her plans for trade and investment.&nbsp; 



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What is your first point of focus as the chair of the South African chapter of the BRICS Business Council? 



It is still early days. I am just lucky I was appointed to
the BRICS Council last year… In my few months, my sense was that the sister
countries in BRICS were much more organized in terms of what it is they are
looking for and in bringing a coordinated voice of business. We were still
trying to get there in terms of coordinating our efforts and channeling our
objectives and making sure we agree on the priorities.



I look forward to, first of all, picking up from where
others left off. This is a council that has been around not long after 2010,
and it has a long-enough track-record. 



I think where things have been done well, we just need to
make sure they are done better. Where there are gaps, I’d like for us to close
those gaps. On the administrative side, I have noticed our sister countries,
the business councils of the other countries, are much more coercively
organized, more streamlined, business has a very strong voice and business
facilitates all of it. 



I would like to see that engagement with all corners of
business, big and small. I think there is room for everybody there. If one
looks at the African continent, the majority of the population is young people.
If we sit in those meetings without understanding the voice of the youth, without
talking to and addressing the issues of the youth, we will be left behind. 



I think it is an opportunity to make sure business rolls up
its sleeves and we actually benefit from the linkages our political principles
have cemented. 



As a woman in leadership, how will you navigate this space? 



It is one that also challenges me ideologically. I never wanted to be labeled ‘the first black woman [in anything]’, and yet I have worked most of my life in environments where it has been lonely just by the mere fact that when the guys are talking rugby, I want to talk about something else. 



Rugby is great, I also enjoy that, but it is also good to talk about other things. One success factor when one is thrown into such environments is to [bring] others in deliberately. I’d love to demonstrate to the women out there that there are opportunities such as these and we need to be there and we need to show up at our best in terms of our game. 



We need to work diligently because when it comes to the results and output, the assessment won’t be based on whether you are a man or woman, it will be based on what you deliver tangibly. South Africa has an opportunity to make the other BRICS countries aware that women have to be at the table and we do it through our actions rather than just talk. 



What is on the 2019 agenda for business in South Africa?



With this being new days, I believe in consultation. I believe in making sure I understand the mandate I have been given. I understand what the Department of Trade and Industry is about, and their focus on creating export opportunities because that will grow our trade. 



I understand their focus on empowerment, because as a country we do need to see a better profile and reflection of society in the economic space. The focus will continue to be on trade and investment, as we move along, I would like for us to do this in an inclusive manner.



Which sector will South Africa prioritize? 



I would definitely take a cue from the president’s [Cyril Ramaphosa] focus on agriculture. Agriculture is fantastic for this continent because we have land, we have the people and if you look outside South Africa, there is water. The resources are there. 



The other side of the coin is that agriculture can be a great employment opportunity. Agriculture is getting more technical and technology-intensive and that excites me. If we had a trading bloc arrangement, we will be talking much bigger opportunities within the country.

Busi-Mabuza

‘Time For Business To Roll Up Its Sleeves’

The film Black Panther  received critical acclaim worldwide.
Zimbabwean actor Danai Gurira from the film chats about the impact it has had
on her life.



January 29 marked the first anniversary since the release of the Black Panther movie.



Worldwide, it grossed more than $1.2 billion ranking as the
tenth top-grossing film of all time.



At the 2019 Golden Globes, which took place on January 6,
the movie was nominated for three awards and was rumoured to be nominated for
an Oscar, which will be hosted on February 25.



Danai Gurira, who plays the part of General Okoye,
represented a fierce and strong woman.



One of the most notable scenes in the movie was when she
took off her wig and used it as a weapon.



She chats to FORBES AFRICA about the impact the movie has
had on her life.



What did being part of a movie like Black Panther mean to you?



It was a really amazing experience to be a part of and, of
course, in my own work as a playwright and an actor, I’ve always been seeking
to give the voice of the African more of a global resonance and response
because I always wondered why we didn’t have that. 



So, the beauty of being a part of a project that did do that
and being able to play a character who was fully feminine and fully fierce and
unapologetic about it allowed me to really be a part of something I wanted to
see growing up. 



I had always yearned to see stories like that, with such
amazing characters I got to work with in that world, in an Africa un-colonized
and excellent and thriving. And it was really an amazing feeling to be a part
of that. 



Did you expect such a huge response from the global audience?



The response, I mean, we couldn’t have predicted that, but I think we were all excited. Peter, Chadwick [Boseman] and the people I got to work with were excited to see this pass; even if we weren’t part of it, we would have supported it. 



It has been a great experience to have and to know that people have had the response they had and we are just thankful.

danai

Danai Gurira: ‘Fully Feminine And Fully Fierce’﻿

Supermodel, Philanthropist, Activist and Cultural Innovator Naomi Campbell, will headline this year’s FORBES WOMAN AFRICA Leading Women Summit, hosted by KwaZulu-Natal Provincial Government, taking place at Durban’s Inkosi Albert Luthuli International Convention Centre on International Women’s Day &#8211; Friday, 8 March.



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“We are truly honoured to be welcoming Naomi Campbell to the fourth
annual FORBES WOMAN AFRICA Leading Women Summit,” commented Methil Renuka,
Managing Editor of FORBES AFRICA and FORBES WOMAN AFRICA, and host of this
year’s event. “Having established herself as a global powerhouse in fashion, Naomi
Campbell has used her fame to benefit vulnerable communities, with much of her
charity work also focused on the African continent. We look forward to engaging
with her at this year’s ‘New Wealth Creators’ summit.”



British-born Naomi Campbell was one of five
original supermodels that revolutionised the fashion industry during the 1990s.
Her work on the runway has seen her grace countless magazine covers, as well as
featuring in numerous television shows, music videos and films. Naomi Campbell has used her unique
position in the spotlight to draw attention to several international charities,
among them the Nelson Mandela Children’s Fund, Made in Africa Foundation,
amfAR, and Breast Health International. 



Her charity work started
alongside Nelson Mandela in 1993, with Madiba bestowing her the title of
‘Honorary Granddaughter’ for her ongoing activism. In 2005, Naomi Campbell established her own charity,
Fashion for Relief which has presented shows in New York, London, Cannes,
Moscow, Mumbai and Dar es Salaam, raising millions of dollars for various worthwhile
causes. 



Sihle Zikalala, the KwaZulu-Natal
Minister for Economic Development, Tourism and Environmental Affairs, said: “We
extend a warm welcome to this year’s headline speaker, Naomi Campbell. We look forward to engaging with her on topics
that will extend the positive impact women in this country, and on the
continent, are having globally. Her involvement in this event indicates the
calibre of this summit, and the strides being taken by African women. We are
proud to have been selected as the host venue for the fourth FORBES WOMAN
AFRICA Leading Women Summit as this gives us an opportunity to showcase the
incredible business opportunities and inviting natural beauty of the place we
call home.”



Attendees to the summit, hosted in association with the IDC, will get
the chance to engage with a selection of the continent’s most influential women
through keynote addresses, panel discussions and personal interviews. In
addition to the daytime networking, attendees to the summit are invited to the
FORBES WOMAN AFRICA Awards’ – a glamorous gala dinner celebrating those who
have made a remarkable impact in the business, sports, science, entertainment
and leadership categories. The gala dinner will take place at Durban’s Inkosi
Albert Luthuli International Convention Centre.



Ticket sales for this dynamic day are now open and includes full access
to the FORBES WOMAN AFRICA Leading Women Summit from 7am to 4pm and the FORBES
WOMAN AFRICA Awards’ Gala Dinner. Tickets are limited so book now!



&#8211;For more information, visit <a rel="noreferrer noopener" aria-label="www.leadingwomensummit.co.za (opens in a new tab)" href="http://www.cvent.com/events/invitation-2019-forbes-woman-africa-leading-women-summit-and-awards-8-march-durban/event-summary-0282df9e080844008d92cc3319de7b9f.aspx" target="_blank">www.leadingwomensummit.co.za</a> or follow <a rel="noreferrer noopener" aria-label="@LWSummit (opens in a new tab)" href="https://twitter.com/LWSummit" target="_blank">@LWSummit</a> on various social media platforms (#LWS2019KZN).



-The FORBES WOMAN AFRICA Leading Women Summit and the FORBES WOMAN AFRICA Awards’ Gala Dinner will be produced by ABN Event Productions.



-Picture: Laspata Decaro

Naomi1

Naomi Campbell Announced As Headline Speaker For The 2019 Forbes Woman Africa Leading Women Summit

billionaires

Fewer Billionaires, Poorer Billionaires On African Continent In 2019

In a surprisingly transparent move, Citigroup revealed that female employees globally earn 29% less than their male counterparts, while U.S. minorities earn 7% less than non-minority employees.



Citigroup is the first U.S. bank to publish unadjusted pay gap figures, which the financial institution&nbsp;<a href="https://blog.citigroup.com/2019/01/global-pay-equity-at-citi" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">defined in a press release as</a>&nbsp;“the difference in median total compensation when we don’t adjust for factors such as job function, level and geography.”



When adjusted to account for these factors, however, the bank said that women globally are paid 99% of what men are paid on average and there is no statistically significant difference between the earnings of U.S. minorities and non-minorities at Citi.



Yet women also remain underrepresented in the bank’s top ranks, Citi’s analysis found. Though women account for just over half of Citigroup’s workforce, they make up just 37% of senior positions between the assistant vice president level and the managing director level.



Still, Citigroup’s wage gap and gender imbalance is far from unique within the traditionally male-dominated banking sector. Women account for just 19% of C-suite positions in financial services, slightly lower than the 22% average for U.S. women overall, according to a&nbsp;<a href="https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/McKinsey/Industries/Financial%20Services/Our%20Insights/Closing%20the%20gap%20Leadership%20perspectives%20on%20promoting%20women%20in%20financial%20services/Leadership-perspectives-on-promoting-women-in-financial-services.ashx?mod=article_inline" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">McKinsey study</a>.



This lack of upward mobility creates a self-perpetuating cycle, in which women find it difficult to advance because there are are fewer women in executive positions who can help them climb the ranks.



Citigroup disclosed its compensation data following pressure from activist shareholder Arjuna Capital, which filed a&nbsp;<a href="https://arjuna-capital.com/news/press-release-arjuna-capital-commends-citi-for-being-first-u-s-company-to-disclose-global-median-gender-pay-gap-data/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">shareholder proposal&nbsp;</a>asking the bank to report on its global median pay gap.



“This new level of transparency provides investors with baseline metrics to understand broad pay equity at the company,” said Arjuna managing partner Natasha Lamb, adding that investors view pay gap disclosures as “benchmarks to improved diversity in representation, and the performance benefits that diversity affords.”



Citigroup’s pay gap revelation reflects a growing push from investors for more diversity in companies’ leadership. Last year, BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, urged companies in which it invests to place&nbsp;<a href="https://www.blackrock.com/corporate/literature/fact-sheet/blk-responsible-investment-guidelines-us.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">at least two female directors</a>&nbsp;on their boards.



Large investors like&nbsp;<a href="https://www.marketwatch.com/story/vanguard-calls-for-more-diverse-corporate-boards-better-climate-change-disclosures-2017-08-31" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Vanguard</a>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/on-leadership/wp/2018/03/07/embargoed-37-8-am-the-fearless-girl-statue-turns-one-today-what-the-campaign-behind-her-says-its-accomplished/?utm_term=.5e95a46c1ca1" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">State Street Global Advisors</a>&nbsp;have also led the charge for more diverse leadership among their respective portfolio companies.



“This is not simply just a good thing to do or corporate responsibility,” Lamb told&nbsp;<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2018-01-16/citigroup-to-bridge-gender-and-racial-pay-gaps-video" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Bloomberg</a>&nbsp;last year, after Citigroup pledged to increase compensation for women and minorities in an effort to bridge pay gaps. “There really is a profit motive here as well in order to attract and retain top talent.”



Countless studies have quantified the benefits of diverse leadership and an inclusive workforce, highlighting&nbsp;<a href="https://sites.lsa.umich.edu/scottepage/home/the-difference/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">increased innovation</a>, strong&nbsp;<a href="https://www.catalyst.org/knowledge/why-diversity-and-inclusion-matter-financial-performance" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">financial performance</a>&nbsp;and lower employee turnover.



For its part, Citigroup pledged to increase representation of women and U.S. minorities in higher-level roles. The company aims by the end of 2021 to hit 40% female representation globally at the assistant vice president through managing director levels and 8% for black U.S. employees.



Citigroup also said it is committed to narrowing the wage gap for both groups, admitting that the company has substantial work to do.



“This reiterates the importance of our goals to increase representation of women and U.S. minorities in senior and higher-paying roles at Citi,” Sara Wechter, Citigroup’s head of human resources, said in a release. “That is how we will reduce the difference in our raw pay gap numbers over time.”

Australian Confidence Plunges Amid Pessimism Over Economic Growth

Citigroup Admits It Pays Women 29% Less Than Men

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has inched up slightly in the eyes of women’s groups who said on Wednesday he has delivered on some promises to make the global organization a feminist institution but faces a major backlash and resistance.



The Feminist U.N. Campaign, a coalition of women’s rights groups, advocates and U.N. staff, gave him a grade of B-, up from the C+ it gave him a year ago.



The coalition launched its report card after the secretary-general said he would be a feminist leader when he took office two years ago.



In that time, the #MeToo campaign against sexual harassment and assault has become a global movement.



Guterres has promoted women’s rights and equality publicly, sought gender parity in leadership and rolled out efforts against sexual harassment and gender-based violence, the report said.



But an internal backlash and bureaucracy threaten his progress. His efforts to make structural changes have met “considerable resistance” from staff and member states that resist women’s rights, it said.



Lyric Thompson, an author of the report and a director at the Washington-based International Center for Research on Women, said she thinks Guterres has “a genuine intent and interest in being a champion” of women’s rights.



“The question is can he do everything in his power to be a feminist leader who enables that transformation and who makes it the new normal?” she said to the Thomson Reuters Foundation.



The U.N. is “years away” from being a feminist institution, and attitudes of immunity and privilege operate to scuttle equality efforts, she said.



Just last week, a U.N. survey showed one third of its staff and contractors experienced sexual harassment in the past two years.



More than 30,000 people answered the survey, complaining of offensive jokes, remarks and sexual stories and of being touched in ways that made them uncomfortable.



The U.N. has tried to increase transparency and strengthen how it deals with such accusations over the past few years after a string of sexual exploitation and abuse accusations against U.N. peacekeepers in Africa.



The head of the U.N. agency for HIV and AIDS is stepping down in June, six months before his term ends, after an independent panel said his “defective leadership” tolerated “a culture of harassment, including sexual harassment, bullying, and abuse of power.”



The secretary-general’s office said it was pleased that the women’s groups saw improvement in Guterres’ handling of gender issues and agreed that more needs to be dome.



“At the same time, we believe the secretary-general has achieved considerable progress within the complex U.N. system at achieving real reforms to make the U.N. a better workplace for women and men alike,” his office said.



Guterres, the former prime minister of Portugal, was sworn in December 2016 after a campaign in which many countries urged selection of a woman. The U.N. has not been headed by a woman since its creation in 1945. -Reuters



&#8211; Ellen Wulfhorst

UN Headquarters As President Trump Weighs Withdrawing From Iran Nuclear Deal

Fight for Gender Equality at UN Faces Tough Internal Resistance, Report Says

If you’ve heard the statistics once, you’ve probably heard them a thousand times: Of the nearly $100 billion in venture funding that goes to entrepreneurs in America,&nbsp;<a href="https://techcrunch.com/2018/11/04/female-founders-have-brought-in-just-2-2-of-us-vc-this-year-yes-again/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">less than 3%</a>&nbsp;goes to female founders and just 0.2% goes to black female founders.&nbsp;



There’s a growing consensus that venture capital’s race problem needs to be fixed.What’s less clear is precisely how to start closing the massive gulf. And at the inaugural Black Women Raise conference in Manhattan on Friday, a gathering of some 80 black female founders, a series of candid conversations laid bare the frustrations around the lack of an obvious path forward. In several raw moments of interchange, however, some answers started to emerge.



Investors &#8220;could ask different questions,” Charles Hudson, founder and managing partner of Precursor Ventures, said during a panel conversation with BBG’s Susan Lyne, First Round Capital’s Hayley Barna, and Female Founder’s Fund Sutian Dong. “There are all these questions—‘Well, do you think she can recruit? Do you think she can hire?’—I know what’s behind that question. 



It’s ‘Do you think she can get people to work for her because she’s a black woman?’ And people ask these, what on the surface sound like innocent enough legitimate questions about investments, but they’re not innocent. They’re loaded. And you learn a lot by the questions people ask.”



Despite the existence (and, arguably, preponderance) of these loaded questions, Hudson and the others cautioned the entrepreneurs in the room against becoming disillusioned with the traditional venture capital community. Instead, they said, minority founders should prioritize investors who have a track record of investing in entrepreneurs who look like them.



“Vet investors up front. Don’t let them waste your time only to give you a half-ass answer after you spend an hour with them or even two weeks later,” said Barna, who started her venture capital career after successfully cofounding e-commerce darling Birch Box. “Just ask, ‘Is this in your sweet spot?’”



Dong noted that investors should be self-monitoring for where they’re over- and under-indexing, too. “We’ve said we don’t like the ratio of founders in our portfolio. About half are nonwhite, but only two are African-American. So we asked our network who we should be talking to,” she said.



It can be hard, in an open and on-the-record forum, to ask the hard questions about investing in underrepresented founders—much less to receive forthright answers to those questions—but to the credit of the Black Women Raise attendees, no one shied away from speaking about the reality of her experience as a founder of color.



“Everyone talks about the ‘friends and family round.’ I raised $63,000; I&nbsp;am&nbsp;the friends and family round,” quipped Star Cunningham, founder and CEO of health management platform 4D Healthware. But underpinning her self-funding, Cunningham continued, was a lack of capital access. “I have debt, because I had to get it, because no one wanted to give me any money. So what are you, as investors, going to do to look at our companies differently?”



Barna’s reply: Don’t be afraid to talk about your distance traveled. “The same stories about people getting straight A’s from Ivy League schools isn’t what gets us fired up; it’s instead hearing about how someone put themselves through med school from driving an ambulance,” she said. “You might think that you’re not supposed to talk about your life story, but I think it’s an important data point in helping [investors] make the right decision.”



This isn’t to say that a little bit of information and clever storytelling will fix the funding gap for founders of color. Viola Llewellyn, cofounder of African fintech platform Ovamba, pointed out as much, saying that many of the investors she’s come across don’t seem interested in asking the questions that lead to the sorts of decisions Barna is referencing.&nbsp;



“Here’s the problem: No one gets punished intellectually, emotionally, or financially for saying no to black women or to Africans. You will instead be congratulated if you don’t make the ‘foolish mistake’ of investing in something that doesn’t fit into the preconceived ideas of what success is,” Llewellyn said to Hudson, Lyne, Barna and Dong.&nbsp;



“At what point do we find a way to tell the story of the fool that said no?” she continued, to applause from the room.



Hudson waited a beat, and responded with empathy.



“There’s a million reasons [for investors] to say no, but until we have more success stories, I think there’s always an easy out for people to say, ‘No one has proven to me that investing in this way and this type of person works out.’ It’s intellectually lazy and it’s wrong,” he said. “You have every right to be angry.”



Angry, yes, but also motivated. Among the clearest takeaways from the conversation is that one of the best ways to change the system is to start from within. In Silicon Valley and&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/dominiquefluker/2018/05/23/arlan-hamilton/#4014dbc63dab" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Arlan Hamilton parlance</a>, fight pattern-matching&nbsp;<a href="https://www.iheart.com/podcast/309-startup-podcast-28030163/episode/arlan-hamilton-3-picking-winners-29309049/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">with pattern-matching</a>.



“More black women need to control capital, in whatever form that may be,” Dong said. “More black women need to be controlling capital to put that into companies run by black female founders.”

gettyimages-891264822-170667a

What Will It Take To Close The Funding Gap For Black Female Founders?

One of the most commercially successful artists in Kenya, Nani Croze, has lived a life few could dare to <g class="gr_ gr_3 gr-alert gr_gramm gr_inline_cards gr_run_anim Punctuation only-del replaceWithoutSep" id="3" data-gr-id="3">imagine,</g> and introduced a new expression supported by her art, philanthropy and entrepreneurship.



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The journey to the Kitengela Glass estate begins like any other from Nairobi. Traffic is often heavy and there is frustration on the roads. But as you pass through the last of it, a different world unfurls. The road is murram (gravelly) and a new settlement is unfolding around it, overlooked by a new railroad track for the high-speed train to Mombasa, recent signs of development consuming the old Maasai plains.



But no less than a mile away, cushioned by the narrow gorges
of the Nairobi National Park, is the entry into a wonderland where the life and
work of German-born artist Nani Croze has concentrated for over the last 40
years. It is an eccentric paradise with a lush covering of indigenous trees and
shrubs, canopies over stunning and colorfully outrageous architecture that
announce the artist in her territory.



However, her life in Kenya was a gift of fate. Croze first
came to East Africa with her first husband, the animal behaviourist, Harvey
Croze, and their children at the end of the 1960s. 



“I came to Africa in 1968 to study elephants in the
Serengeti and four years later, the study was finished and we decided to go
back across the continent back to Europe. I filled a VW van with my three kids,
safely in the back, and we got as far as the Kenyan border. The car broke down
and we stayed&#8230;and that was that,” she tells me in the aviary area outside her
house as birdsong echoes around generous foliage.



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="962" height="555" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nani31.png" alt="" class="wp-image-38656" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nani31.png 962w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nani31-300x173.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nani31-600x346.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nani31-768x443.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 962px) 100vw, 962px" /><figcaption>Glass work by artist Nani Croze. Picture: Supplied</figcaption></figure>



Mother Nani, or ‘Mama’ to the community of artisans and
their families that also call Kitengela Glass home, is a matriarch in this
setting. Her hair is pinned up in a loose bun revealing tanned cheeks and
piercing blue eyes. 



A formidable painter and muralist, Croze is an artist of
many mediums. However, a little-known fact is her life in science. As a young
woman, she convinced the Nobel Prize-winning biologist and founding father of
the science of animal behavior, Konrad Lorenz, to work under him. Her earlier
works depict this scientific knowledge in lively wildlife motifs.



Nonetheless, she is perhaps most known, these days, for her
work with glass. Her estate is testament to this; colored glass panels of all
shapes and sizes line the structures at the entry of her world. The winding
walkway is flanked by sculptures accented with thick glass. The outdoor seating
is dalle-de-verre. 



The workshop and furnace are open for passersby to see. Its
products, ever-present at every corner of the estate, also decorate the
balustrades of the estate’s gallery, roof to her personal studio, intentionally
constructed around a formidable mogumo (African fig) tree, a souvenir from the
early days. She found it growing on the barren plains of what would become
estate when she arrived in 1979, a genus local legend claims can never die.



By this then, a single mother of three, Croze stumbled in to
the glass arts out of economic necessity.&nbsp;
She had purchased the land from the Maasai community of the area and
was, at the time, a working muralist. 



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="922" height="618" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nani11.png" alt="" class="wp-image-38657" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nani11.png 922w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nani11-300x201.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nani11-600x402.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nani11-768x515.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 922px) 100vw, 922px" /><figcaption> Glass work by artist Nani Croze. Picture: Supplied </figcaption></figure>



“My architect [told me] ‘you can’t pay school fees with
murals, you better start something new, what about stained glass?’” she
recalls.



An influx of Christian missions meant that stained glass
windows were crucial for finishing new churches and, as an art, they were more
profitable. This has since expanded to a wide-range of recycled glass products
from blown glass to beads, mosaics, murals, sculpture and, of course, dalle de
verre. However, the stained glass studio, the first on the estate, still
remains, busy and peopled, tucked away in a quiet corner of the gallery
building.



Croze, perhaps one of the most commercially successful
artists in Kenya, is often credited for introducing this new craft to the
region. She herself is self-taught and along with her son, Anslem, trained by
glass-blowers in the South of France and Holland, built the first furnace in
East Africa. He eventually took over the glass-blowing side of the business and
now runs his own studio next door along with an eponymous retail brand in
Nairobi selling decorative glass vessels, furniture and lighting. 



In her own right, Nani is responsible for training the first
Kenyan glass artisans, initially in stained glass and then in glass-blowing and
mosaics.



“We started together, my first [assistant] was a man called
Omondi. We started on stained glass-making and how it works and it’s quite a
process but once you’re in it, like all my guys here&#8230; you get quite good at
it. It’s a traditional and weary process but once you have [the finished
window] you have something beautiful that can never be undone,” she says.



Of the things that cannot be undone is Croze’s legacy not
only within the community of the estate and the industry she has created around
it but in the lives of many in East Africa.



Kitengela Glass is home to more than 50 artisans and their
families, many of whom have gone on to build independent careers in and outside
of glass art. An example is Edith Nyambura, formerly the resident mosaic
artist, who began her career at Kitengela and eventually wrote a book about her
work in 2010. 



There is also the young Patrick Kibe, colloquially known as
‘Mr. Dudu’ (Mr. Insect in Kiswahili), who arrived as a student at the estate
almost a decade ago and is now carving his own niche, creating figures and
sculptures of indigenous flora and fauna from recycled materials.



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="810" height="537" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nani4.png" alt="" class="wp-image-38658" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nani4.png 810w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nani4-300x199.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nani4-600x398.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nani4-768x509.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 810px) 100vw, 810px" /><figcaption> Glass work by artist Nani Croze. Picture: Supplied </figcaption></figure>



Then there is the school Croze founded, not far from the
estate, often billed as the first of its kind in sub-Saharan Africa. Her
motivation was to introduce to the country the creative education she had
received as a young girl in Germany, which she regretted that her own children
did not have attending local schools.



“We have such terrible schools in Kenya that are so bad for
children! A child should grow up free, they should have music, art, new
movement and environment,” she laments.



The Rudolf Steiner School started with a class of 10 in
Nairobi’s leafy Karen suburb, popularly known as the setting of Out of Africa,
Karen Blixen’s pre-colonial odyssey. 



“It took its time. We had a very good worldwide sponsorship,
especially from Germany. We’ve had our ups and downs but now we have two in
Karen and the other one in Kitale [in western Kenya].”



In addition to her contributions in education, she is also a
key campaigner for young artists across Kenya. She is the founder of the annual
Kenya Arts Diary, a weekly calendar and catalog of up-and-coming contemporary
artists in the country.



The ninth edition was released in November with an exuberant
exhibition at the Nairobi Museum and since its founding has been produced by a
group of passionate volunteers. Every year, she picks up two artists featured
in the diary and invites them to a residency at the estate. The inspiration for
the project, she says, was her father, the acclaimed German woodcut artist HAP
Grieshaber, who also took a similar interest in his students.



“He would always help his students. Art is very expensive
most people can’t buy it so you either make it yourself or you make sure it
happens. The diary is just a venue to make sure people buy it and see it every
week,” she notes.



Although the next issue of the arts diary will be her last,
Croze remains ever passionate about her adopted home and community and hopes to
continue giving back to it while she is still alive.



“I was the first mzungu [Caucasian] in Maasailand&#8230;we had a
really good relationship and we still have with the Maasai community but my Ma
is still not very good, I must say. I feel very much a part of the community,”
she says.



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="463" height="616" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nani21.png" alt="" class="wp-image-38659" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nani21.png 463w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nani21-300x399.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nani21-225x300.png 225w" sizes="(max-width: 463px) 100vw, 463px" /><figcaption> Glass work by artist Nani Croze. Picture: Supplied </figcaption></figure></div>



Croze is a focal point at the Nairobi National Museum, from
the dalle-de-verre mural that welcomes museum-goers at the main exhibition
hall, to her mosaic path that snakes through the museum gardens to the goliath
metal and glass sculptures that mark the way through the complex. She remains
one of the few living artists in Kenya to have such a permanent and public
showing.



Even away from the whimsical glass oasis that she has built,
echoes of her are littered across Nairobi. Her commissioned murals on major
commercial buildings such as the American Embassy in the city’s diplomatic district.
She was the first to color the walls of the newly-established United Nations
Environmental Programme, UNEP, in 1972. Her art is also at the Times Tower in
the heart of the old city, home to the tax authority. There are also pieces
dotted across the region, a recent commission at a call center in Eldoret, in
western Kenya, and the windows at the Serena Hotel in Kigali.



“I just want to make sure that it all keeps going.&nbsp; There are always problems here and there, all
the time, but I want to keep it going,” she says.



Croze, true to her word, is still going with plans for a
vocational school to train a larger population of recycled glass artisans in
the nearby township of Tuala. Plans are also underway for a devotional school
to replace her personal chapel that was lost in a land dispute and, of course,
more commissions while she is still able to work on them. 

On the future of the world around her, a life’s
work, she is surprisingly indifferent. “I leave it to the Gods,” she ruminate

nani

IN PICTURES | The glass ceiling is what she makes it

Gracia Bampile’s dislike for African print made her turn it
around into a full-time obsession.



It all began with a pink dress – a present she received a
week before her seventh birthday from her parents. Gracia Bampile put it away
excited for the day she would wear it.&nbsp; 



She recalls going to school and telling everyone about her
new outfit. The enthusiasm, however, was short-lived. She changed her mind
about her gift the moment she wore it and took a closer look at it.&nbsp; 



“I remember thinking I would rather not celebrate my
birthday. I was traumatized… The dress was just horrendous.”



The material felt like plastic, it was ugly, it was not the
right fit, and even for a seven-year-old, she knew the design did not make the
cut. 



“I felt like I was wearing a granny dress. My birthday was
just ruined by that dress,” Bampile recollects.



&nbsp;“I got so angry with
my parents that I couldn’t let go. That’s how my passion for fashion started. I
didn’t want to feel like that again.”



<ul class="wp-block-gallery columns-1 is-cropped wp-block-gallery-1 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex"><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="409" height="618" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/dress6.png" alt="" data-id="38682" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38682" class="wp-image-38682" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/dress6.png 409w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/dress6-300x453.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/dress6-199x300.png 199w" sizes="(max-width: 409px) 100vw, 409px" /><figcaption> Model Reitumetse Mokutu in a Gracia Bampile creation. Picture: Motlabana Monnakgotla </figcaption></figure></li></ul>



That was her epiphany, the start of a fashion journey,
disliking African print as a result of a bitter experience. She thought it was
too bright and stayed as far from it as she could.



&nbsp;Today, Bampile is a
fashion entrepreneur setting the standard for African print. She is the founder
of Haute Afrika, a contemporary brand that prides itself in affordability and
class.



She was born in a small town called Goma in the east coast
of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) in 1991 – on the border line of
the DRC and Rwanda. At the age of six, Bampile and her family left the DRC,
leaving her seamstress-grandmother behind. They moved to East Africa and lived
in Uganda for about seven years, then Kenya, then arrived in South Africa when
she was 19. They left due to the conflict in the DRC that still rages on. 



“My granny was a tailor. At some point, she stopped making
clothes. My gran didn’t teach me to sew on purpose… [Yet], on holidays, we
would go visit her in Rwanda and I would be her assistant,” says Bampile.



Just two years later, her aging grandmother saw her
resourcefulness and promoted Bampile to crafting complete garments. 



That is how her style evolved, through her grandmother’s
experience in sewing. She was big on quality and passed it down to the next
generation.&nbsp; 



<ul class="wp-block-gallery columns-1 is-cropped wp-block-gallery-2 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex"><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="414" height="617" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/dress1.png" alt="" data-id="38683" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38683" class="wp-image-38683" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/dress1.png 414w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/dress1-300x447.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/dress1-201x300.png 201w" sizes="(max-width: 414px) 100vw, 414px" /><figcaption> Model Reitumetse Mokutu in a Gracia Bampile creation. Picture: Motlabana Monnakgotla </figcaption></figure></li></ul>



“That is something that is seen in Haute Afrika’s designs
today. My garments are not constructed to sell, we are big on quality and our
sewing is impeccable,” says Bampile.



Her complicated relationship with African fashion changed,
the more she interacted with patterns and the creation of garments. 



“When I got to the age of 15, I thought maybe it’s not the
African print [that’s the problem], it was probably the way it was presented to
me. I went on a journey of rediscovering African print and design. My love for
it was revived,” she says.



When she was a teenager, African print was not readily
available. Her mind-set then was not to be a designer, she simply wanted to
look good and got her clothes made by a tailor.



By 2012, when Bampile was 21, African print was rising in
popularity – people started wearing it and it was easily accessible. 



This was also a time when Bampile was in varsity and
experimenting with African patterns. She says people would stop her and ask
about her garments, and the idea of Haute Afrika began simmering in her mind. 



“It started as an African fashion blog; I started an
Instagram account, opened a Facebook page and reposted other people’s designs
because I didn’t have my own stuff. I never saw this as an actual thing, it was
just for fun,” she says.



“Clearly, it’s not the material or the tradition or the
culture [that’s the problem], it’s just the way it was presented. And that’s
what I’m big on – presenting African print as your normal everyday wear. 



“I want to you to be able to wear this dress to church,
work, a birthday party, a baby-shower or to a wedding.”



In her new collection, she aims to simplify African print as
much as possible. There is less extravagance and the ordinary bright colors
persist, to attract the everyday person who wants to represent Africa. 



The brand was launched in 2016 after she started taking it
seriously as a profession. She went back to her grandmother for design advice.
She started doing research and did a short course in fashion to enhance her
credentials. 



Importing material from Nigeria, Congo, Ghana and Turkey,
Bampile intends to expand her reach to other parts of the globe. 



“The next step for the brand actually scares me. Sometimes I
feel like my dreams are crazy. The name haute itself means height/high in
French, so in fashion, haute couture means high fashion, but for me it’s Haute
Afrika because this is Africa, I want Africa to have a brand that is big on its
own and emphasize quality. 



<ul class="wp-block-gallery columns-1 is-cropped wp-block-gallery-3 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex"><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="412" height="616" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Dress3.png" alt="" data-id="38684" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38684" class="wp-image-38684" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Dress3.png 412w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Dress3-300x449.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Dress3-201x300.png 201w" sizes="(max-width: 412px) 100vw, 412px" /><figcaption> Model Reitumetse Mokutu in a Gracia Bampile creation. Picture: Motlabana Monnakgotla </figcaption></figure></li></ul>



“This means taking Africa out of Africa. European brands are
coming into Africa, but why aren’t African brands going out?” she says.



Haute Afrika mostly sells online, to clients outside South
Africa. She says her biggest clients are in Europe and America. Her most recent
buyer was from Indonesia.



Speaking about her progress in the industry, Bampile adds:
“I previewed my stuff at the Free State Fashion Week and it was super-awesome. 



“The reaction was just unbelievable. Some designers take
years to showcase at a fashion week and I took two.



“Last year, I was really surprised. I did 10 weddings –
three white and the other seven were traditional. I couldn’t believe people
trusted me with their weddings when they haven’t seen [enough of] my work.”



In 2018, she scaled up, doing about 15 weddings. 



“I am also proud of myself this year because I have more
people buying Haute Afrika for everyday wear,” she says.



The requests from her clients have also diversified. 



“A gentleman came in and he wanted a transformation of his
wardrobe. We made 10 pants for him. That’s what he’s probably going to wear
next year. I’m also proud of the fact that I’m not only attracting people that
have events, but also the everyday person, which is what I wanted to do with my
collection.” 



Bampile employs two full-time and two part-time workers at
her studio in Sandton, miles away from that first garment that wrecked her
seventh birthday but made her whole life.&nbsp;




<hr class="wp-block-separator"/>



<ul class="wp-block-gallery columns-1 is-cropped wp-block-gallery-4 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex"><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="410" height="617" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/dress4.png" alt="" data-id="38685" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38685" class="wp-image-38685" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/dress4.png 410w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/dress4-300x451.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/dress4-199x300.png 199w" sizes="(max-width: 410px) 100vw, 410px" /><figcaption> Model Reitumetse Mokutu in a Gracia Bampile creation. Picture: Motlabana Monnakgotla </figcaption></figure></li></ul>

dress7

IN PICTURES | The ugly dress that made this designer

From auditioning for the formidable female lead in one of South Africa’s most popular soapie, Generations, to now offering a chance to aspiring actors in her own productions,



Connie Ferguson’s is now looking for billions in the business world. 



READ FULL STORY | <a rel="noreferrer noopener" aria-label="Lights Camera Connie! (opens in a new tab)" href="https://www.forbesafrica.com/cover-story/2018/10/15/lights-camera-connie/" target="_blank">Lights Camera Connie!</a>



Video Produced by Forbes Woman Africa Multimedia journalist Karen Mwendera.

connie

WATCH | The making of 2018’s most popular Forbes Woman Africa cover – Connie  Ferguson

Thembi Kgatlana’s goal was to make a living playing abroad.
She is now proving to be a star of not just South African football but also the
African game.



As South African forward Thembi Kgatlana crashed home a volley in the closing minutes of their African Women’s Championship match against nemesis Nigeria, she wheeled away in celebration, accepting the passionate thanks of her teammates.



Kgatlana had sealed just a second victory for South Africa
over their old foes in 25 years of trying and for her, it capped a remarkable
2018 that has seen her thrust onto the global stage and into the best women’s
football league in the world.



The goal provided all you need to know about the Leratong
hospital-born footballer – the awareness to make the run, the speed to get away
from the defender, the confidence to take on the shot and the technique to
finish past the goalkeeper.



Kgatlana must be one of the quickest players in women’s
football, but she has been eager to show in the last 12 months that her game is
about much more than pace and she has certainly developed quickly after a first
year spent at Houston Dash in the National Women’s Soccer League in the United
States (US).



She was there with national teammates Janine van Wyk and
Linda Motlhalo in 2018, and will return with the latter in 2019 having had her
professional contract that she worked so hard to earn, renewed for another
season.



She had hoped to move abroad after the 2016 Olympic Games,
where she represented South Africa, but it took a further 18 months for a club
to finally take a punt on her talent.



“The wait has been worth it,” Kgatlana tells FORBES WOMAN
AFRICA with a broad smile, adding her debut for Dash was unforgettable despite
a 3-0 loss.



“It was a moment I had always dreamed of, that I had waited
for so long for and made so many sacrifices for. I’ll cherish it for the rest
of my life.”



She says her goal has always been to play abroad and make a
living out of football. The South African domestic scene is still amateur and
cannot provide that support.



“It’s a dream I have been working towards for the whole of
my life, since I started playing as an eight year old, working my way through
the junior national teams, then to the senior national team. It’s been a long
and a hard road, but I’m here now,” Kgatlana says.



She admits her first year in the US was an eye-opener in
terms of the level of football and the commitment players put into the game.



“You really have to work hard, everyone is professional and
most have been playing at this level for quite a while. They have the
experience.



“It’s all about learning and adapting quickly. In life, you
face challenges and it’s up to you what you do with those.



“I had to drop out of school [University of the Western
Cape] in my final year to wear a professional jersey and to be in the fold to
win a contract with a big club.



“I hope it motivates a lot of girls back home to show that
anything is possible and dreams do come true.”



The 22-year-old made 16 appearances in her first season with
Dash, scoring two goals but also providing a number of assists.



She was used a lot as an impact player off the bench, her
extreme pace allowing her to glide past weary defenders in the closing stages
of matches. She will want to turn those into more starts in 2019, but also
understands her role within the side.



It is also something she has taken on with the national
side, known as Banyana Banyana, where she has been an integral part of the
set-up for some time, and was named Player of the Tournament when the team
lifted the COSAFA Women’s Championship in 2016.



While one player’s career can never be defined by a single
goal, Kgatlana has managed to write her name into the history books of Banyana
with what is one of the more famous strikes against a Nigerian side that has
been the number one team in Africa for many years.



“It was the most amazing feeling ever, because I knew that
if I let it bounce a second time, I might not get the chance,” Kgatlana says.



“It’s either I hit it and I see what happens, or I don’t hit
it. The adrenaline was rushing, because every time I get into the box, I’m
still deciding. But at the moment, when the ball bounced, it was now or never.”



Kgatlana has announced herself as a genuine star of not just
South African football but also the African game and her challenge in the
coming years will be to kick-on and continue to improve.



She certainly has the drive, passion and the skill to do so, and her development into potential global icon over the next few years will be fascinating to watch.



<ul><li>Nick Said </li></ul>

Thembi

The Long And Hard Road To Houston From South Africa

One of the biggest names in television came to South Africa for what she believes are the greatest challenges affecting girls and women.



Oprah Winfrey was the keynote speaker at Isithunzi Sabafazi which means the &#8216;Dignity of women&#8217;, in tribute of Nelson Mandela. He would have turned 100 years in 2018. 



<ul><li>Produced and edited by Forbes Woman Africa Journalist, Karen Mwendera. Shot by Jolly Ndlovu.</li></ul>

oprah

WATCH | Oprah Winfrey Advocates for Women and Celebrates Nelson Mandela

The Blue Nile pours out of Ethiopia’s Lake Tana as a gentle bubbling stream. Around is an ancient land with life-giving waters.



<hr class="wp-block-separator"/>



If one needs to be transported to biblical times, the time machine to do so resides on the banks of the Blue Nile in Ethiopia. This ancient land of many cultures and religions has resisted modernity, leaving many of its traditions intact, as I witnessed traveling through the historic Christian circuit of Ethiopia.



The mysterious Nile was long-hidden from Western geographers
and explorers. It was not until the expeditions of such great travelers as
Bruce, Burton, and Speke in the 18th century that the origins were confirmed:
the White Nile originates in East Africa’s Lake Victoria, while the Blue Nile
pours out of Ethiopia’s Lake Tana. 



It merges with the smaller tributary, the White Nile, at
Khartoum, Sudan, to form the mighty Nile River. 



<ul class="wp-block-gallery columns-3 is-cropped wp-block-gallery-5 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex"><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="928" height="579" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile5.png" alt="" data-id="38541" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38541" class="wp-image-38541" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile5.png 928w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile5-300x187.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile5-600x374.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile5-768x479.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 928px) 100vw, 928px" /></figure></li><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="931" height="575" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile161.png" alt="" data-id="38545" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38545" class="wp-image-38545" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile161.png 931w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile161-300x185.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile161-600x371.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile161-768x474.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 931px) 100vw, 931px" /></figure></li></ul>



<ul class="wp-block-gallery columns-3 is-cropped wp-block-gallery-6 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex"><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="927" height="581" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile72.png" alt="" data-id="38548" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38548" class="wp-image-38548" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile72.png 927w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile72-300x188.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile72-600x376.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile72-768x481.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 927px) 100vw, 927px" /></figure></li><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="906" height="575" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile91.png" alt="" data-id="38549" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38549" class="wp-image-38549" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile91.png 906w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile91-300x190.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile91-600x381.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile91-768x487.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 906px) 100vw, 906px" /></figure></li></ul>



The Blue Nile was responsible for the annual floods that
contributed to the fertility of the Nile Valley and subsequent rise of the
Egyptian civilization. This ended with the construction of the Aswan Dam in the
1960s in Egypt. 



For my exploration, I started in Addis Ababa and flew into
Bahir Dar, a clean, safe and well-maintained city (by African standards) and
the closest approach to the Blue Nile. 



It offers access to more than 20 of&nbsp;the world’s oldest monastic churches&nbsp;that date back to the 14th century, located on the peninsulas and islands of Lake Tana. I hired a boat that regularly plies Lake Tana to visit many of its churches and small villages. 



I was quite surprised to see locals operating papyrus boats (tankwas) that have been in use since the 9th century BC, either to fish or transport firewood across the lake. The only other place where I have seen papyrus boats still in use was in Lake Titicaca, Bolivia.&nbsp; 



<ul class="wp-block-gallery columns-3 is-cropped wp-block-gallery-7 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex"><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="824" height="585" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile1.png" alt="" data-id="38550" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38550" class="wp-image-38550" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile1.png 824w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile1-300x213.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile1-600x426.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile1-768x545.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 824px) 100vw, 824px" /></figure></li><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="931" height="580" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile4.png" alt="" data-id="38551" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38551" class="wp-image-38551" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile4.png 931w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile4-300x187.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile4-600x374.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile4-768x478.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 931px) 100vw, 931px" /></figure></li></ul>



<ul class="wp-block-gallery columns-3 is-cropped wp-block-gallery-8 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex"><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="962" height="580" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile3.png" alt="" data-id="38552" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38552" class="wp-image-38552" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile3.png 962w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile3-300x181.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile3-600x362.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile3-768x463.png 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile3-400x240.png 400w" sizes="(max-width: 962px) 100vw, 962px" /></figure></li><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="928" height="581" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile21.png" alt="" data-id="38553" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38553" class="wp-image-38553" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile21.png 928w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile21-300x188.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile21-600x376.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile21-768x481.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 928px) 100vw, 928px" /></figure></li></ul>



My biblical adventure took me first to the magnificent 14th
century Ura Kidane Mehret church decorated with its astoundingly beautiful
murals painted more than 250 years ago. 



From a rather humble building, some of Ethiopia’s fabled
treasures were revealed to me by a priest of the church: ancient parchment
books from the 9th century, jewel-studded crowns of emperors, historic battle
implements and the mummified remains of 14 of Ethiopia’s most revered emperors.




I was quite surprised at the poor quality of the storage
cabinets and an absolute lack of proper security for such priceless treasures.



It barely took a five-minute drive from the lakeside town of
Bahir Dar to reach the spot where the Blue Nile flows out of Lake Tana as a
gentle bubbling stream. But driving further downstream for about 40 kilometers,
the power of the first cataract of the Blue Nile can be appreciated at Tis-Isat
village. The village is a market settlement of the Amhara people who have
inhabited this area for over 2,000 years, farming crops like wheat, sorghum and
teff (from which injera, the delicious national bread, is made).



<ul class="wp-block-gallery columns-3 is-cropped wp-block-gallery-9 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex"><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="502" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile2-1024x502.png" alt="" data-id="38554" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38554" class="wp-image-38554" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile2-1024x502.png 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile2-300x147.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile2-600x294.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile2-768x376.png 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile2.png 1074w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure></li><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="928" height="577" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile14.png" alt="" data-id="38556" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38556" class="wp-image-38556" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile14.png 928w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile14-300x187.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile14-600x373.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile14-768x478.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 928px) 100vw, 928px" /></figure></li></ul>



<ul class="wp-block-gallery columns-3 is-cropped wp-block-gallery-10 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex"><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="889" height="582" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile81.png" alt="" data-id="38557" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38557" class="wp-image-38557" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile81.png 889w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile81-300x196.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile81-600x393.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile81-768x503.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 889px) 100vw, 889px" /></figure></li><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="926" height="573" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile10.png" alt="" data-id="38558" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38558" class="wp-image-38558" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile10.png 926w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile10-300x186.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile10-600x371.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile10-768x475.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 926px) 100vw, 926px" /></figure></li></ul>



The footpath leaving the village meanders first beside fertile open fields, then drops into a deep basaltic rift. After about a 30-minute walk, a stiff climb up a grassy hillside is rewarded by a magnificent view of the falls, breaking the smooth edge of the rolling river into a thundering cataract of foaming white water. 



The approach to the falls was surreal with cowherds playing the flute and local women gathering water from the river in ceramic amphoras (ancient jugs) – scenes that were truly biblical. The Tis-Isat falls had been one of Ethiopia’s major tourist attractions until a decade ago.



 Little did I realize that what I saw, despite being impressive, was a far cry from its gloried past. Since 2003, a giant hydroelectric power project has reduced the giant half mile wide water curtain to a mere third of its size. Even though there were many gorges nearby to install a power plant, the government decided on this easier location which has unfortunately affected fish farming in Lake Tana and tourism in the area. 



Unlike some of the great falls of the world – Niagara, Victoria
and Iguaçu – with endless hotels and tourist offerings nearby, the falls of the
Blue Nile are located in a pastoral and primal setting that should showcase its
natural might, but it’s being slowly being dammed into silence. Many young
rural women and some men in the area sport tattoos of traditional designs,
which are as diverse as Ethiopian society, usually indicating the bearer’s
cultural, religious and ethnic background.



<ul class="wp-block-gallery columns-3 is-cropped wp-block-gallery-11 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex"><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="925" height="579" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile12.png" alt="" data-id="38559" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38559" class="wp-image-38559" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile12.png 925w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile12-300x188.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile12-600x376.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile12-768x481.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 925px) 100vw, 925px" /></figure></li><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="931" height="577" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile19.png" alt="" data-id="38560" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38560" class="wp-image-38560" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile19.png 931w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile19-300x186.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile19-600x372.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile19-768x476.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 931px) 100vw, 931px" /></figure></li></ul>



<ul class="wp-block-gallery columns-3 is-cropped wp-block-gallery-12 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex"><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="928" height="582" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile13.png" alt="" data-id="38561" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38561" class="wp-image-38561" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile13.png 928w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile13-300x188.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile13-600x376.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/nile13-768x482.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 928px) 100vw, 928px" /></figure></li><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="931" height="579" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile15.png" alt="" data-id="38562" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38562" class="wp-image-38562" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile15.png 931w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile15-300x187.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile15-600x373.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile15-768x478.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 931px) 100vw, 931px" /></figure></li></ul>



Traditional tattoos have many forms — from rows of blue or
black lines from chin to chest, dots on the forehead to crucifixes or crescents
on the back of the hand and tattoos designed to darken pinkish gums.



Meran Kabede, a young lady in her 20s peered through my car
window, as I was taking photos of her tattoos. “I am ashamed of my tattoos. My
mother told me that it would beautify me but my friends in Bahir Dar tell me
that it’s a sign of backwardness and ignorance,” she said in halting English.
While I appreciated the beautiful and unique facial decorations, I could very
well see her desire to shed her rural identity for more modern times.



Not much has changed along the river bank over the centuries; donkey carts transport goods inland while papyrus and dugout boats carry people across the different villages lining the river. 



<ul class="wp-block-gallery columns-3 is-cropped wp-block-gallery-13 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex"><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="974" height="575" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile17.png" alt="" data-id="38563" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38563" class="wp-image-38563" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile17.png 974w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile17-300x177.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile17-600x354.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile17-768x453.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 974px) 100vw, 974px" /></figure></li><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="927" height="569" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile18.png" alt="" data-id="38564" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38564" class="wp-image-38564" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile18.png 927w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile18-300x184.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile18-600x368.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nile18-768x471.png 768w" sizes="(max-width: 927px) 100vw, 927px" /></figure></li></ul>



One man, carrying an ancient firearm on his shoulder, claimed to be protecting himself from any number of ethnic conflicts that could arise. The Eritrean, Somali, South Sudan and Kenyan border areas have always been areas of unrest. In fact, I was fully escorted by a Kalashnikov-toting soldier for my tour of the highlands near the Eritrean border. 



This ancient land with life-giving waters, in an otherwise parched landscape is both a blessing and curse for Ethiopia. The sharing of the Nile waters has become a contentious issue in Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia where the population explosion has put pressure on water consumption. It is often said that the world’s next war will be fought over water and there are few places as tense as along the river Nile.



-Ramdas Iyer

nile-6

IN PICTURES | Along the banks of Ethiopia’s Blue Nile

Veteran Nigerian artist Nike Davies-Okundaye has made her name innovating the art of her heritage and giving other women hope by paying it forward.



<hr class="wp-block-separator"/>



The best learning process of any kind of craft is just to look at the work of others,” says Nobel prize-winning Nigerian novelist Wole Soyinka on pursuing a life in the arts.



This observation is perhaps most true when applied to the
life and work of fellow citizen and internationally-renowned batik artist,
Chief Nike Davies-Okundaye. 



Born in 1951 in Ogidi-Ijumu, a small village in western
Nigeria known for its spectacular rock formations and traditional art industry,
Davies-Okundaye has reached the pinnacle of her career thanks to an enduring
dedication to preserve and innovate the culture of her people.&nbsp; 



The daughter of impoverished traditional artisans, she did
not, like many artists of her stature, receive any formal education in art or
preparatory schooling. The poverty of her childhood led her to leave school
after the sixth grade. Instead, she was trained informally in the traditional
crafts of her people through methods practised by women in her family for
generations.



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="411" height="616" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nike.png" alt="" class="wp-image-38525" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nike.png 411w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nike-300x450.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nike-200x300.png 200w" sizes="(max-width: 411px) 100vw, 411px" /><figcaption>Veteran Nigerian artist Nike Davies-Okundaye. Picture: Supplied</figcaption></figure></div>



Yet, over a career spanning five decades, Davies-Okundaye
has gone on to educate generations of artists, at no cost to them, through a
network of art centers across Nigeria. A far cry from the girl shaped by
tragedy very early in life. 



“I lost my mother when I was six and I lost my grandmother
when I was seven. The knowledge was passed on to me by my great-grandmother who
was the head of all the weavers in our village,” she recounts.



Following the death of both her mother and grandmother, she
was taken in by her great grandmother, an established adire, a specialist in
the traditional art of fabric dyeing of southwest Nigeria. From her,
Davies-Okundaye learned to weave fabric on traditional looms beginning the
family’s fifth generation in the craft.&nbsp; 



Her father, too, was a practitioner of the traditional arts.
An accomplished basket weaver, he also practised embroidery and leather work
and was a known musician in the community. 



In Ogidi, parents passed on their skills to their children
in a form of vocational training concentrated within the household.
Davies-Okundaye started as early as seven.



“Once in a week, they taught me crafts. This craft they [taught] is for [us] to be able know how to do handwork&#8230; so that’s how I was learning.” she recalls. 



An adept student, drawing from her family’s many artisanal
specializations, she quickly developed her own style and technique in textile
weaving and painting. 



Unfortunately, the young woman wasn’t allowed to nurture her
talents for long. Her family made the controversial decision to marry her off
when she was just 14 years old, an event that would impact the course of her
life very powerfully.



“They married me to a minister who already had four wives!
This is why I ran away from home and joined a traveling theater,” she says.



It was the traveling theater that took her to Osogbo, the
Nigerian town where she first established herself as an adire in her own right.
Historically, it was the source of beautiful handmade indigo textiles and, in
the 1960s, it became a nucleus of contemporary African art in the country.&nbsp; 



Indigo to the Yoruba people is the color of love. The
process of adire-making is therefore a labor of love. It involves extracting
indigo from the indigenous elu plant using labor-intensive techniques followed
by painting and resist-dyeing the fabric with a homemade cassava emulsion. 



As she became better versed in adire, Davies-Okundaye
decided to sell her work in what would be her very first gallery, out of her
bedroom, in 1968. This was her entry into a formal career in art.



<figure class="wp-block-image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="501" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nike4-1024x501.png" alt="" class="wp-image-38526" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nike4-1024x501.png 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nike4-300x147.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nike4-600x293.png 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nike4-768x375.png 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nike4.png 1262w" sizes="(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /><figcaption> Batik art by Chief Nike Davies-Okundaye. Picture: Supplied</figcaption></figure>



‘I called it African Art Number One Shop and I noticed that
it was only expatriates that would come to my shop and buy the pieces,” she
says.



During this time, she matured as an artist, experimenting
with fabric design and painting as well as teaching herself a new language,
English, to communicate with her foreign buyers. 



One of them was Alan Donovan, the acclaimed American
gallerist and collector of African artifacts. Arriving on the continent in 1967
as an aid worker during the Biafra War, Donovan took every opportunity to
travel around West Africa discovering the art and culture of the region.



When he stumbled upon Osogbo, it was inevitable that he
would end up at the door of the African Art Number One. Now living in Kenya,
Donovan became a repeat customer. He would return time and again, encouraging
her to make more work, which he would take to Nairobi. 



Her work would be distributed to discerning collectors like
Donovan. Among them was Joseph Murumbi, Kenya’s first Vice-President and one of
Africa’s most recognized private art collectors. From that one-room gallery,
Davies-Okundaye reportedly sent over 100 pieces of her work and that of other
Osogbo artists to Nairobi.&nbsp; 



In 1972, Donovan organized the Nigerian Festival, part of a
pan-African trade fair, in Nairobi. This was officially Davies-Okundaye’s
international debut at the gallery of the African Heritage House, founded by
Donovan and Murumbi’s wife, Sheila, the same year. The partnership continued
for decades, returning Nike numerously to Nairobi for East African exhibitions
of her Adire.



Interest in Kenya led to her first international tour,
taking her to the United States at the invitation of the American government,
along with 10 other established artists from across the continent. The
experience, she insists, was a catalyst for the founding of her art centers and
business in Nigeria.



“We were privileged to be the first artists from Africa to
travel to America in 1974. They asked us to bring something back that would
benefit our people. They took us to galleries and museums and they allowed us
to see their craft,” she remembers.



What she brought back was an even greater passion and
understanding of art, one that has led to philanthropy via her eponymous art
centers. The first opened in 1983, where she worked with disenfranchised women
on the streets of Osogbo. There, much like her own informal education, she
shared with them her skills in adire, weaving, painting and other traditional
arts for free. The centers have since grown to three in other Nigerian cities:
Abuja, Lagos and her hometown, Ogidi.



The Lagos center also houses Davies-Okundaye’s monumental
art gallery, said to be the largest in West Africa with over 8,000 pieces from
artists across Nigeria. The gallery, which opened in 1996, was a direct influence
of her American tour in the 1970s.



“The gallery that had in Osogbo was nothing compared to what
I saw [in the US] and I [wanted] to build a gallery where everyone’s voice
would be heard,” she says.



True to form, the gallery has achieved all that and more.
She has been responsible for discovering new talent in the country and actively
takes on an up-and-coming artist every month, building her collection and
diversity of voices piece by piece. 



Any one of these young artists may look at her career and
wonder where her secret to success lies. She is honest about the obstacles in
an industry that in many parts of the continent remains largely unrecognized.



“I always know my work. So whatever you do, you need to do
it very well and I tell people don’t rush, you will get there at the end of the
day. Have peace in your heart,” is her advice.



However, the patience that has carried her through has been
fueled by careful financial planning. As an entrepreneur, Davies-Okundaye has
endured because of this. She reinvests at least two-thirds of her income in her
business and art centers. 



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="402" height="612" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nike5.png" alt="" class="wp-image-38527" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nike5.png 402w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nike5-300x457.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/Nike5-197x300.png 197w" sizes="(max-width: 402px) 100vw, 402px" /><figcaption> Batik art by Chief Nike Davies-Okundaye. Picture: Supplied </figcaption></figure></div>



“Always plan ahead because if you make money today, you may
not make any for several months. I keep working. Even if I can’t sell any
pieces, I’ll find other work to pay for the materials,” she says.



This earnest combination of hard work, frugality and
philanthropy has made Davies-Okundaye a veteran artist of not only Nigeria but
of Africa. She has had pieces on permanent display at the Smithsonian
Institution’s National Museum of African Art in Washington DC for the past six
years.



The Gallery of African Art in London held a month and a half
retrospective of her work in 2014. Next year, she will return to the
Smithsonian for a celebration of her 50-year-career. Her work is cherished in
private collections all over with world. 



That doesn’t stop her from adding to her repertoire. Aside
from adire and textile painting, she recently began working with beads,
producing intricate portraits depicting life across Nigeria, completing a
single piece over the course of a year.



Even at 67, Davies-Okundaye has no plans to retire. 



“I still make time for my own work&#8230; and I still manage to cook for my husband,” she laughs.



-Marie Shabaya

nike1

The material of life according to textile queen Nike Davies-Okundaye

For the fashion-conscious Nigerian elite, Lagos has a new
design paradigm that could rival some of the world’s best brands.



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The Lagos Fashion &amp; Design Week (LFDW) in October 2018
saw more than 50 top designers congregate to create everything from intricate
wedding gowns with stunning fabric, woven with traditional techniques from
across the country to high-end and trendy ready-to-wear pieces for the
upwardly-mobile millennial consumer. 



The annual LFDW has a vision to create a fashion platform
that merges the Nigerian and African fashion industry together as well as
providing a marketplace for buyers, consumers and the media to view the current
collections of designers at a four-day event filled with glitz and glamour. 



According to a report by McKinsey, the global fashion
industry is projected to reach a staggering $2.4 trillion in 2016. 



Nigeria’s fashion retail market itself accounts for about
$4.7 billion according to data from Euromonitor. However, Nigerian fashion
brands need to warm up to the emergence of a new connected consumer,
well-synced with the latest in global apparel and fashion trends, if they are
to capture a due share of this growth. 



<ul class="wp-block-gallery columns-3 is-cropped wp-block-gallery-14 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex"><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="414" height="618" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi4.png" alt="" data-id="38484" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38484" class="wp-image-38484" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi4.png 414w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi4-300x448.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi4-201x300.png 201w" sizes="(max-width: 414px) 100vw, 414px" /><figcaption> Folake Akindele (left). Picture:Supplied </figcaption></figure></li><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="411" height="613" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi3.png" alt="" data-id="38485" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38485" class="wp-image-38485" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi3.png 411w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi3-300x447.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi3-201x300.png 201w" sizes="(max-width: 411px) 100vw, 411px" /><figcaption> Folake Akindele design. Picture:Supplied </figcaption></figure></li></ul>



This is certainly one aspect Folake Akindele, founder of
fashion brand, Tiffany Amber and one of the most revered designers in Nigeria,
is hoping to address with her new collection, ‘Made in Africa, Made for Now’. 



“Tiffany Amber was the first ready-to-wear brand in Nigeria.
I remember when I launched, I said I wanted to bring African women in line with
fashion trends around the world. Because I was the first in this industry, I
had to make my own rules because there was nobody out there to look up to,”
says Akindele, who studied in the cool climes of Switzerland. Her mission is to
change the perception of Nigerian fashion but that was not always her calling. 



“The real flair for fashion came when I went to law school
in Abuja. I made clothes for myself and everyday, people would stop me and ask
‘where did you buy these clothes from’? So one day, I decided to make two
suitcases of clothes to make a little side business and I sold them in two
hours and that is when I decided to toy with the idea of fashion as a
business,” she says.



Nigeria’s fashion designers have found their way into the
global market in many ways over the past couple of years. For instance,
Akindele was recently short-listed to showcase her line at the fashion week in Paris;
Maki Oh’s outfit was worn by pop sensation Beyoncé in her Lemonade video and
Deola Sagoe has featured at the New York Fashion Week. 



But a new breed of designers and entrepreneurs passionate
about securing Nigeria’s place in the global fashion scene is rising and
Akindele is leading that charge.



<ul class="wp-block-gallery columns-3 is-cropped wp-block-gallery-15 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex"><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="413" height="604" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi7.png" alt="" data-id="38486" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38486" class="wp-image-38486" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi7.png 413w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi7-300x439.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi7-205x300.png 205w" sizes="(max-width: 413px) 100vw, 413px" /><figcaption> Folake Akindele&#8217;s designs. Picture: Supplied </figcaption></figure></li><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="404" height="600" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi6.png" alt="" data-id="38487" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38487" class="wp-image-38487" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi6.png 404w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi6-300x446.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi6-202x300.png 202w" sizes="(max-width: 404px) 100vw, 404px" /><figcaption> Model in a Folake Akindele creation. Picture:Supplied </figcaption></figure></li></ul>



But today’s consumers are pushing for fast fashion where
brands are being forced to create new collections faster if they want to stay
competitive.



“We are in what I call the new design paradigm where consumers
want great products that are trendy and unique at great value and at even
greater speed. This puts pressure on new designers who invariably now fixate on
curation over creation,” says Akindele.



This year marks her 20th year as a designer and 15 years since
she launched Tiffany Amber. It is now time to take her brand global.



“I wanted the foundation of the brand to be so strong in
Africa that it becomes a heritage brand before I can grow globally. For about
10 years, I was uninterested in the global market. I wanted to focus on Africa
because I found it interesting that you travel to so many parts of Africa and
you cannot go shopping because there are not many African brands. It was my
first show at the New York Fashion Week that made me fall in love with the idea
of the global scene because the brand was so very well-accepted and we got
invited for the second and third time.” 



With the emergence of e-commerce as a popular channel for
fashion buying, the onus is now increasingly on brands to be collaborative and
innovative. This is difficult in an industry that according to Akindele has
traditionally struggled to raise capital.



“Years ago, the fashion industry was seen as what bored
housewives do. There was no structure to the industry. The funding to grow and
be an industry that attracts money is nowhere to be found here. When you look
at Europe, eight of the richest men are all in the fashion industry. As
Africans, we love to look good and nobody can dress an African the way we can
dress ourselves. So there has to be capital injection in this sector to
encourage more young people to see this as a sector worth going into.” 



There is also a lack of skilled labor as well as access to
quality raw materials to produce designs that meet international standards in Nigeria.
More importantly, Nigeria’s fashion industry needs to recognize that the modern
Nigerian consumer is no different from her counterparts in the west. Brands
need to demonstrate savviness in embracing social media marketing as well as
spotting the latest trends that appeal to the African consumer in order to
create a lucrative business.



<ul class="wp-block-gallery columns-3 is-cropped wp-block-gallery-16 is-layout-flex wp-block-gallery-is-layout-flex"><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="410" height="617" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi1.png" alt="" data-id="38488" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38488" class="wp-image-38488" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi1.png 410w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi1-300x451.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi1-199x300.png 199w" sizes="(max-width: 410px) 100vw, 410px" /><figcaption> Folake Akindele&#8217;s designs. Picture: Supplied</figcaption></figure></li><li class="blocks-gallery-item"><figure><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="496" height="614" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi2.png" alt="" data-id="38489" data-link="https://www.forbesafrica.com/?attachment_id=38489" class="wp-image-38489" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi2.png 496w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi2-300x371.png 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/lumi2-242x300.png 242w" sizes="(max-width: 496px) 100vw, 496px" /><figcaption> Model in a Folake Akindele creation. Picture:Supplied </figcaption></figure></li></ul>

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